Perfect sailing conditions of 18-20 knots delivered exciting and veryfast racing around the windward/leeward course. The 470 Women's fleetare sailing as one fleet, through until the Medal Race on Sunday whichwill see only the top 10 boats competing.

Their win in race 3 put the Spanish up into third overall, just behindPenny Clark/Katrina Hughes who at that point were at the top of theleader board, with Japan's Ai Kondo/Wakaka Tabata in third. A secondrace win to the Spanish and the front of the leader board was in theirhands.

Days don't get much better, "No for sure," affirmed Betanzos. "It washard as in the first race we were fighting with the British, Italiansand Germans, but in the end we could take it. The British passed us inthe downwind, but finally we passed them on the inside. We were toofast," Betanzos continued. "We were pleased with our speed and sailedthe boat really well." Betanzos would not compare their gold medalwinning form at the 2011 470 European Championships a few months agowith their performance so far in Perth, commenting , "Yeh, but this islong and it is the beginning and you never know. "

Race 3 wasn't an easy success for the Spanish as they battled withGiulia Conti/Giovanna Micol (ITA) and Penny Clark/Katrina Hughes (GBR)for the overall lead, finishing second and third respectively.

Jostling with the top boats overr the first four legs of race 3 wereTina Lutz/Susann Beucke (GER) as the front four places rotated amongstthe teams. Lutz/Beucke ended race 3 in fourth and followed it up with a15th in race 4 to move up the leader board to twelfth.

Lutz/Beucke team broke into the world's top 10 ranked teams in June 2011and are here in Perth hoping to secure Germany's nation qualificationand Olympic selection over their team mates Kathrin Kadelbach/FriederikeBelcher. If the name sounds familiar, it is, as Friederike is married toMat Belcher who just three days ago claimed the Men's 470 WorldChampionship. Mat has stayed on in Perth to support his wife.

Meanwhile supporting the Lutz/Beucke is Zebra who can be found onboardTina and Susann's 470, as team figurehead. The Zebra theme flowsthroughout their boat - from Zebra deck decals to black and white lines!In with a hit at taking the race 3 win, Beucke said, "We rounded the topmark second, but the other teams caught us on the downwind." In race 4they converted a 29th place at the first mark to a 16th by the finish,which Beucke put down to, "We have quite good boat speed upwind and wejust tried to sail the shifts and had some luck. We will just sail ourown race and see how it comes together at the end with our points."

Only six years ago Lutz could be found at the helm of her Optimistdinghy winning the 2005 Optimist World Championships, and now theOlympics beckon.

Race 4 again belonged to the Spanish, who secured supremacy from mark 1.It was another really close battle at the front, but this time with GilCohen/Vered Buskila (ISR) and defending World Champions LisaWesterhof/Lobke Berkhout (NED), with the race finishing in that order.

Overnight leaders Ai Kondo/Wakako Tabata (JPN) posted an 13,4 to end theday in third overall.

The only team in the 470 Women's boat park who is already guaranteed togo to the 2012 Olympics are Hannah Mills/Saskia Clark, who will berepresenting host nation Great Britain. Four top ten scores places themin sixth overall at the end of day 2, but gear failure unseated them abit today, as Clark explained, "We lost our port trapeze wire at the topof the first beat so we had to spend the whole race swinging it round.And then on the final run we lost our starboard run as well, so we hadto the reach without a spinnaker and hike it down. The culprit was aslipped knot that came undone and so I went for a swim and it was a bitconfusing to start with as we couldn't work out what had happened.Really stupid gear failure."

Australians eyes are following Elise Rechichi/Belinda Stowell around thetrace track. Individually they have achieved Olympic and WorldChampionship glory and together they have the potential for furthergreatness. As a new pairing they are yet to show the pace which hassecured medals in their past and for them the 2011 470 WorldChampionships is primarily about 2012 Olympic nation qualification andselection, as Rechichi explained, "Guaranteed Olympic selection for usis a top 6 finish. If we make the top ten we make the Australian SailingTeam and it is discretionary from there. Outside of the top 10 and Ithink the chances are pretty slim to go to the Games."

Rechichi who is participating in her seventh 470 World Championshipsused just four words to sum up yesterday's 23,28 scorecard, "What adisaster." But today was an improvement, "I was disappointed yesterdaybecause the results were bad and we raced so far below our ability. Ifelt bad for our coach even having to watch. The results today were notamazing but certainly much, much better than yesterday and we wereactually in the game today and pushing and racing in our normal style.We still gave a few places away, but we were under no illusion at thestart of this regatta that there were going to be plenty of mistakesmade by us and we would have to minimise the damage and take ouropportunities when we had them."

Sailing pedigrees in the fleet don't get much better than theRechichi/Stowell partnership, who combine multiple Olympic and WorldChampionship successes. Responding to how they have combined their vasttalent and experience to kick start their campaign, Stowell said,"Having the knowledge and the experience of how to perform in differentsituations is definitely a benefit and understanding that we are bothoff the same page, so we have very similar mind sets in a lot ofsituations and our approach to the whole campaign is very similar."